Missing the Point
by KaseyM1113
Summary: When Lily gets some exciting news, her plan to tell James doesn't go quite as well as she thought it would.


**Now that the contest is over, I can finally post this. I wrote this for the FanFicAholics Anonymous 100 Pictures Challenge. My picture prompt was a porcelain doll and this is where it took me. **

**Their blog can be found at http:/fanficaholics(dot)blogspot(dot)com and it's definitely worth checking out! **

We'd been cleaning out the basement when we found it. I'd forced James to help me with some spring cleaning. We were going through random boxes our friends had placed down there when they helped us move to the house. Bent over one of the boxes, I heard James say from across the room, "What in the world is this? It's hideous."

Having discovered the box was full of pictures taken at various points in my life, I stood up and began looking through a handful of them. "What is it James?" I asked, focused more on the pictures of my sister and me as young children than on my husband's answer.

"I think it's a doll, but I swear it's the ugliest thing I've ever seen." His voice sounded odd. Almost as if he were unsure of himself.

Finally looking over at him, I discovered he was indeed holding a doll. It looked familiar to me, though I couldn't quite place it.

"What the hell is this even doing in our basement?" he asked, still sounding off. "Do you think the old owners were horrible, mean parents, and they bought it for their child or something?"

His words spurred my memory. I knew why I recognized that doll, and my doofus of a husband was insulting the very first present my father had ever given me. Unknowingly, yes. That didn't stop my eyes from narrowing at him.

"That thing you are currently declaring ugly as anything, ever, in the history of the world, ever, happens to be the doll my father bought for me after he and my mother found out they were having another girl." His eyes got huge, a hint of panic buried deep inside, as he realized exactly what he had just done. "While I realize you are a boy, not to mention an only child, and you are, therefore, not familiar with what dolls looked like when we were born, that doll means a whole hell of a lot to me, and I will not have you insulting it, thank you very much. It's one of the only things I have left of him." Damnit, my voice catches at the very end. My father died when I was young, still early in my Hogwarts years. Petunia had destroyed a lot of the things I'd left behind, furious about my "freakish powers" not being enough to save him. I had snuck the doll to school with me in my trunk, and I thank God everyday that I decided to defy my parents and bring it with me anyway.

"Baby," he says, his voice careful, probably due to the tears I was struggling to not let fall, "I'm sorry. I had no idea. You've never said anything about your father having bought you a doll. You're right, I don't know what dolls look like, even still. I assumed they were softer and lifelike, not porcelain like this."

I'm still trying not to cry, and have my eyes closed, when I feel his arms wrap around me and his hand start stroking my back. "Lils, please don't cry. I didn't mean to upset you. I'm so sorry." The sound of the desperation in his voice defeats me, and I begin sobbing in his arms. I try telling him I'm sorry for how I'm acting. I know I seem crazy; I don't even know why I'm crying, but I can't seem to stop. I'm sure he doesn't understand a word coming out of my mouth, but he just stands there holding me, one hand buried in my hair, the other rubbing my back as he tries to calm me down.

MTP

A week has gone by since we found the doll. I found out yesterday why I broke down like that. I still can't believe it, but the Mediwitch can't be wrong about something like this. I'm pregnant; my emotions are all over the place. She swears my breakdown was completely normal given this fact, but it doesn't make me feel any better.

I have absolutely no idea how I'm going to tell James about this. I know he won't be mad. We weren't trying to get pregnant, but at the same time we weren't trying not to get pregnant either. I just don't know how to tell him. I tried last night when he got home from work. He knew I'd gone to the Mediwitch that morning, he asked what she'd said, and despite my best efforts I just couldn't make my mouth form the words.

Walking into our bedroom, I see the doll sitting on our bed, and an idea begins to form in my mind. But, will James get it? Guess we'll find out tomorrow.

MTP

"Lily?" I hear James calling after I hear the door open and close. "Sweetheart, where are you?"

A small smile on my face, I call out, "I'm in the kitchen," as I head back to the stove.

"This is going to sound really weird, but ..." he pauses here, reaching up to run his hand through his hair, a gesture I have grown to love despite its having once made me crazy.

"What is it darling?" I ask, still smiling at him.

"Well, when I got to work this morning, I opened a drawer in my desk and well ..." he pulls the doll out of his pocket and cancels the charm he'd placed on it so it returns to full size, "this was sitting in it. I have no idea how it got there, though."

Clearly he's not getting what I'm trying to tell him with it. I decide to pretend I don't know what's going on either. "I don't know, James. That's really weird. I wonder how it could have gotten in your desk drawer."

"No idea," he says, before vanishing it back upstairs where it belongs. "So, what are you making for dinner, Mrs. Potter?"

MTP

The next day, as I'm making myself a sandwich, I hear the sound of a fire starting in the living room fireplace. "Lils, can you come in here really quick?" I hear James yelling to me from the direction of the fireplace. Setting down the knife I was using to cut bread, I hurry into the room and drop down in front the fire where his head is currently floating.

"What is it, James? Is everything alright?" I ask, trying to keep my voice even.

"Yeah, everything's fine, sweetheart, didn't mean to scare you. It's just, well, your doll was in my desk again this morning. It's the weirdest thing. I checked it, there's no spells or charms or anything on it that I could discover, yet here it is. I don't get it."

He's still not getting it. I thought he was smarter than that. Continuing to pretend I don't know anything, I plaster a bemused smile on my face and say, "Well, as strange as it is, there's nothing we can do it about it now. Send it through, so I can put it back upstairs."

"Ok, dear, I'll see you later. I love you," he tells me, his lopsided smile in place.

"I love you, too, James."

MTP

"Ok, this is seriously getting out of hand!" James shouts as he walks through the front door less than an hour after he's left for work. "This doll has appeared in my desk every day for a week now. Sirius saw it this morning. If the mutt ever lets me live it down it'll be a damned miracle."

I'm grouchy, and his yelling is doing nothing to help my mood. It's early, I slept really poorly last night, and I have yet to have my coffee this morning as I've been struggling to keep my breakfast, a single piece of dry toast, in my stomach. "James, maybe there's a reason it keeps turning up," I tell him, teeth gritted, my eyes closed so I can't see the room spinning.

"What possible reason could there be for your doll to be in my desk drawer? I mean really, what the hell?" I know he only sounds so aggravated because he's confused, and he doesn't like not understanding things, but his tone sets my temper off.

"I don't know, James," I begin, my voice ominously quiet, "maybe someone's trying to tell you something with it, and if you pulled your head out of your ass you'd realize that."

There's a moment's stunned silence, before he bites out, "What in the mother of hell could someone possibly be trying to tell me by continuously putting a twenty year old doll in my desk at work?"

Oh, he's going to regret that tone. "I don't know, James. I mean, what could someone possibly be trying to tell you by placing the doll her father bought for her once he and her mother found out they were _pregnant_ with a girl? Why, it's a total mystery. Absolutely mind boggling." The nasty tone in my voice and all the sarcasm aren't getting through to him. Fuck this, I do _not_ feel well enough to put up with his stupidity right now. "Ya know what, James? I feel like shit right now, and this isn't helping. When you've finally pulled your head out of your ass long enough to figure out that I'm the one who's been putting that doll in your desk, in what was clearly far too subtle an attempt at telling you I'm having a fucking baby, one that unfortunately shares your thick as shit DNA, come find me."

With that I stormed off toward our bedroom, enjoying the sound of the silence behind me. My exit would have been much more effective if I hadn't gotten lightheaded halfway up the stairs, stumbled, and had to grab onto the handrail to prevent myself from falling back down them. Once my heart started beating again, I sat down on the stairs hard, breathing heavily with my head between my legs. Finally feeling back in control of body, I lifted my head to see James standing at the foot of the stairs, staring at me with what could only be shock in every line of his face. Seeing him looking at me like that is more than I can take, and I immediately burst into tears.

The sound of my sobs must shock him back to reality because he comes rushing up the stairs and immediately tries to put his arms around me. I'm still upset with him though, and shrug him off. He just sits there quietly watching me, I can feel his eyes burning a hole into the side of head. When I finally calm back down, he hesitantly asks me, "Did you really just say what I think you did?"

At the sound of his voice, I turn my head, which is still on my knees, to him, and the look on his face just about breaks my heart. He's so terrified at the thought of a baby, I can see it all over his face. From his wide eyes, to his scrunched eyebrows and forehead, to the way he's chewing on the inside of his bottom lip. Part of me feels like some kind of terrible person for making him feel this way, but as much as I would if I could, I can't undo this. Letting out a quiet sigh and closing my eyes, I confirm what is apparently one of his greatest fears, "Yeah, James. I found out last week from the Mediwitch. I'm so sorry. I know the timing is horrible, and apparently this is the last thing you wanted to happen but it has. There's ..."

Before I can even figure out where my sentence is going, I feel first James' hands cupping my cheeks and lifting my face, then his lips pressing against mine. Clearly he's trying to shut me up; he's lucky this is my favorite way for him to do so. When he finally pulls away, I open my eyes to see the most amazing smile on his face. "We're having a baby?" he asks, sounding awed at the very concept.

Unable to stop it, a smile lifts the sides of my mouth, and I simply nod at him. He lets out a whoop of what I recognize as uncontrollable joy and dives for my lips again. He pulls away again quickly and jumps up from his spot next to me to run down the stairs. At my disbelieving laugh, he swings around and tells me, "Let me just call the office. I need to tell Moody I'm taking the day off to stay with my _pregnant wife_. And I need to tell Padfoot he's going to be a godfather," then takes off for the living room at a sprint.

A few minutes later I hear him shout, "We're having a baby! I'm going to be a father, man!" followed by the unmistakable sound of Sirius' laughter. I can't help but smile at the image forming in my head of the man I love and his best friend. I'm so lucky.


End file.
